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Given the improvement of tier two nations, is it time to introduce new international knockout tournaments on a four year cycle between Rugby World Cups?
I would suggest a European Cup and a tournament for the rest of the world (name suggestions welcome).
The international rugby calendar is the same every year outside of World Cups and Lions tours.
The Six Nations and The Rugby Championship are great but they are closed fence, first-past-the-post competitions.
Outside of these tournaments, most games are played for trophies fans don’t really care about. And tier two sides rarely play matches against top nations, making it harder for them to develop.
In football, the European Championship, Asian Cup and African Cup of Nations are big events held between World Cups. They help break up the international calendar and generate huge interest.
Rugby is now in a position where it should look to create similar competitions.
These sort of tournaments – not so frequent and held in a host country – bring fans together in a way annual events never do.
In recent years, the second tier of European rugby has improved considerably.
This weekend Georgia defeated Samoa, who beat both Scotland and Italy in June.
A couple of weeks before, Romania defeated a Tongan side that got within 10 points of Wales on Friday.
Russia, Spain, Portugal and Belgium are not so far behind them.
A 12 team European Cup (two pools of six, followed by semi-finals) would be plausible for 2017, with the goal to increase it to 16 teams when possible, perhaps as little as four years later.
While it would be great to have similar tournaments for every region, this is not yet possible outside of Europe. However, you could have a pretty good competition by combining the other regions.
Think a tournament between New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Argentina, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Japan, USA, Canada and two additional qualifiers from Africa, Asia, South America or the Pacific (most likely to be two out of Uruguay, Namibia, Korea, Chile, Zimbabwe or Kenya).
At full strength, the Pacific Island nations have been competitive pretty consistently and would only benefit from such a tournament.
Japan, USA and Canada are also becoming increasingly competitive. This year Japan defeated Wales (albeit a Wales B team), while the USA and Canada (both minus some of their European pros) were competitive against a Maori All Blacks side stacked with Super Rugby talent.
It will not be long until these teams are genuinely able to challenge tier one sides, and they need more opportunities to do so.
Events like these would help grow the game internationally and give existing rugby countries more opportunities to host major tournaments.
They’d also provide fans with more meaningful knockout-style Test rugby.
Such competitions could be played in place of the Six Nations and The Rugby Championship for that year.
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